Phil McConkey
Played 6 years in the NFL as a WR, punt returner and kick returner for the Giants, Packers, Cardinals and Chargers. Played college football at the Naval Academy and served in the U.S. Navy before joining the NFL. Best remembered for his oustanding game in Super Bowl XXI.

Worth the Trouble?

When a person Googles "Darrelle Revis Unhappy with Contract," they will find plenty of results. A little less than a million, actually. It seems that Revis is simply a player that may never be happy with his deal. Because of this and because of the money Revis costs already, the Jets are considering their options. I will spit out a few stats here about his dominance, but there is no doubt that the cornerback out of Pittsburgh is a rare commodity. The words "shutdown corner" are not thrown around in a loose manner. Revis is one of the few out there. Is he worth 1/7th of a team's salary cap?

Darrelle Revis became a dominant corner quickly. By his second season, teams were already shying away from his side of the field. Most attempts were futile. In 2009, Pro Football Outsiders ranked him as the top corner in the league. In 2010 and 2011, though, he was still pretty good according to their metrics, but he did allow almost three more yards per play in his direction. The advantage he gave is that reputation kept him dominant because teams simply did not throw his way very often. Teams went his way about twice a game in 2010. They got more daring in 2011 and threw at him about four times a game. It's hard to gain yards on a guy if he is never tested.

Unfortunately, dominance is not the big question surrounding Darrelle Revis. There are several other major points to consider. First and foremost is the money and how it relates to Revis' consternation. His unhappiness seemed to begin in June of 2010 when Manish Mehta reported that Revis may hold out then. Also, I just have to interject something here. I have never met Mr. Mehta, but I imagine his personal life to be a model of placidity. I would want to rid my life of all drama if I had to cover the Jets. Anyway, Revis had now played this same game with his contract in each of the last three seasons despite eventually getting paid in 2010 with a deal that awarded him $30 Million over the first two years of the contract. It seems that the cornerback wants something nearing the money that Peyton Manning and Drew Brees earn. Is there any way that it is possible that he could be worth that?

Well, let's say a modern elite quarterback produces a dozen more touchdowns than the average quarterback in the league. How many does Revis prevent? He does give up a couple each season, but with the way the ball is spread around by offenses, it would be tough to say that he prevents that many. Maybe he prevents six or eight per season. That's highly valuable, but not as valuable as an elite quarterback.

Also, the league is trending toward even more implementation of spread offenses and 3+ receiver sets. What does that do to his value since he is best at being a physical man-to-man corner? Can he make the adjustments in his game to continue to take away an entire side of the field? Revis has been considered to be an average run defender in his career. Are teams better off getting two or three above-average corners than getting Revis? Certainly, there has to be some offensive coordinators that will be perfectly happy playing ten on ten football when their quarterback is also a running threat.

Finally, what about that whole knee injury thing? Research by the sabermetrics crowd in football and other sports implies that the real peak of an athlete's performance is somewhere between the ages of 25 and 27. When camp starts, Revis will be 28 and coming off that injury.

The timing of Revis' recovery constricts the options the Jets have with him. They can save some money by cutting him, but that costs the value of a good asset. Even that has to be considered, though, with the Jets sitting somewhere around $19 million above the cap. Despite the questions above, there will be teams lining up to get the star player. The best thing for the Jets would probably be to trade him near draft time, but medical questions may prevent that possibility. Revis cannot be franchised, a part of his 2010 contract, so it is likely that the trade would happen as soon as he is healthy. In 2013 or 2014, Darrelle Revis will be getting a lot of money to play for a team because that is how things happen in the free agency era. Just let these words serve as the warning they are.

BTW, xmenehune, your assertion of our ability to draft is crazy off kilter. Lately we've sucked at drafting lb's and dline (sans Woodley and Timmons). Our 2 first round d line guys? Not even close to potential. Every lb drafted the last 5 years not named Woodley or Timmons totally sucks.

Every db on our team is a draft pick or udfa, except Clark and Allen. Every corner is.

No offense, but I'd suggest you not make such bold assertions, unless you can back them up with data.

I'm not trying to sell anything, it's my opinion after eons of watching football since the 70's. I see things as more cyclic, what was old is new again. The running game is back again (for instance)

So though I don't think PIT will take Revis due to their drafting habits (and release even good players if they don't fit in). I do think PIT CBs aren't as good as you think. It's my opinion, I'm a fan of the game, I don't have rose colored glasses or at least I don't think I do. Everyone has a bias, I might not be aware of one that I have.

Weight in opinion that's verified by facts and stats? A lot of that is what many people quantify. I may be alone, but I'm comfortable when I state what I see, even when it's not backed up with stats.

I just know I can't explain everything I know or have seen. I have other friends who are PIT fans, just like you they can name players from years gone by, recite situations and that's all great, all of you are highly passionate PIT fans.

I love the game, the teams have and ebb and flow to each of them. For some teams it seems to last longer than other and again media pundits try to put an explanation to it via staffing or stats.

It's like some say 'past performance is not indicative of future success' or 'nothing is guaranteed'. PIT is on the ebb..

PIT does have a history of drafting well along their front 7 on D, etc, etc.

I don't play Madden, never have. This is a forum for opinions, If you don't like mine. Fine, I'll still state it(my opinions), w/o the use of constant use of stats or with the use of stats if that suits me.

Scouts and working in the football community is a lot of who you know, (and will continue to be so). Being credible is in the eye of the beholder. I obviously won't hold any weight with you or any other person on this forum who wants to argue from a stats point of view. So I'm not arguing with you or anyone else. I'll continue to post my view, dismiss it all you want...

I agree that in the short term Pittsburgh seems to be on the decline. The reasons for long-term decline almost always seem to be related to the front office, however, and there I think things are pretty solid in steel land, so I would expect them to find their way again.

I'm less sanguine about organizations like Miami, Phoenix, Dallas and Jets,to name a few.

I'm not trying to sell anything, it's my opinion after eons of watching football since the 70's. I see things as more cyclic, what was old is new again. The running game is back again (for instance)

So though I don't think PIT will take Revis due to their drafting habits (and release even good players if they don't fit in). I do think PIT CBs aren't as good as you think. It's my opinion, I'm a fan of the game, I don't have rose colored glasses or at least I don't think I do. Everyone has a bias, I might not be aware of one that I have.

Weight in opinion that's verified by facts and stats? A lot of that is what many people quantify. I may be alone, but I'm comfortable when I state what I see, even when it's not backed up with stats.

I just know I can't explain everything I know or have seen. I have other friends who are PIT fans, just like you they can name players from years gone by, recite situations and that's all great, all of you are highly passionate PIT fans.

I love the game, the teams have and ebb and flow to each of them. For some teams it seems to last longer than other and again media pundits try to put an explanation to it via staffing or stats.

It's like some say 'past performance is not indicative of future success' or 'nothing is guaranteed'. PIT is on the ebb..

PIT does have a history of drafting well along their front 7 on D, etc, etc.

I don't play Madden, never have. This is a forum for opinions, If you don't like mine. Fine, I'll still state it(my opinions), w/o the use of constant use of stats or with the use of stats if that suits me.

Scouts and working in the football community is a lot of who you know, (and will continue to be so). Being credible is in the eye of the beholder. I obviously won't hold any weight with you or any other person on this forum who wants to argue from a stats point of view. So I'm not arguing with you or anyone else. I'll continue to post my view, dismiss it all you want...

Cool... Have whatever opinion you choose, just forgive me for challenging it and then dismissing it.

No offense, but you've done a horrible job explaining what you've said. You've been a fan since the 70's? Great. I've been since the 80's. I'm no young buck speaking of just stats. I'm an old guy, an ex MLB, who trusts what he sees 1st, and uses stats to back that up. Your experience you allude to is a non factor. I'm not 19, and I'm not blind to the trends.

Is there an ebb and flow and a cyclical nature to the league? Yep, sure is. However that ignores what actually happened, and what the stats bear out. It's why I take exception to what you said, given I watched all the games (at least twice), and what I saw was proven to be true with stats. Were taking about what happened. You're side stepping. Everything I challenged that you said was factually incorrect. Have your opinion, but when its proven to be bunk man up and say so. Don't point to allegories and a perceived strength in experience, when it isn't so..

As a side note, you're treading in shark infested waters when you opine about any team that isn't yours, and have no credible evidence to defend your point. Post as you like, have your opinions. Just don't expect me to take you task when you post stuff.about my team that has no base in reality.. I'm just sayin..

Ike Taylor is a very solid and dependable corner. He is not in the upper echelon, when forced to cover number ones. This is not a bad thing. he does everything he asked to do, but he can be exposed at times. he isn't that young either. This Lewis kid I haven't seen play, but from what I've heard he looks good.

DIck lebeau is the reason why that pass defense is still good. Nobody knows coverages mixed with zone blitzes like Dick. I've only seen him screwup once, and it was against Tebow last year (he gambled that tebow couldn't throw deep, when the game plan should have been to force him to throw the short intermediate stuff). If he ever retires, then you will see a downgrade in the defense.

The above is the same reason why I'm not ready to kill Dom Capers. He screwed up by not preparing for the pistol, but the 49ers played possum the last weeks with it. But he does still produce a pretty good pass defense with a lot of ball hawking week to week as well.

Ike Taylor is a very solid and dependable corner. He is not in the upper echelon, when forced to cover number ones..

Iwatt, I don't like to parse posts when I reply and I'm doing so simply because what you're saying I don't agree with. I posted this earlier in the thread,and I'll do so again because its pertinent.

Since 2005, our #1 corner Ike Taylor has played 65 games vs pro bowl receivers. BTW he plays man up on them, on an island. In those games he has allowed an average of 2.2 catches for 31.2 yards. Only a td once every 6 games vs EVERY pro bowl wr he's faced.

Seems to me he locks down #1's quite well. I'm sure that opinion comes from the advanced stats (that I know you love) that we've both looked at prior to saying anything.

Advanced stats will never favor Pittsburgh corners. They're expected to play a compete game. Give run support, and play the man not the ball. This leads to near zero picks. I'll post the ridiculous lack of stats Ike allowed last year after I did through my posts to find them

That said, Ike may not be top 5, but he's top 16 for sure. Lewis is top 32. Our corners are good to great. They most certainly aren't bad.

Pro football focus has Ike ranked as 33rd this year. In part because he didn't play enough snaps this year. If you look at the more advanced stats they have, he ranks at 15th in coverage, and 35th in run tackling. Looking at game by game, he struggled the first 6 weeks, and was back to the trustworthy Ike until week 13.

2011: 11th in coverage, but 48th in run tackling.
2010: 22nd in coverage, but 52th in run tackling.

I just finished "I'm off to be the Wizard" by Scott Meyer. It started off really strong. Great concept, well thought out. It's a 3 book series (so far) and the first 1/2 to 3/4 of the first book was...